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Dive into the historical events of World War I, the vibrant Roaring '20s era, and the significant Great Migration. Question the normative and descriptive aspects of history including the criminal justice system and US involvement in conflicts. Explore the impacts of new techniques in WWI, the end of progressivism, and the realities of war. Examine the economic influences and political agendas during this transformative period in US history.
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Unit #3 HIST 1302: US History II WWI, The Roaring 20s, and The Great Migration
Is History Normative or Descriptive? • Normative v Descriptive (4:00): • https://www.khanacademy.org/partner-content/wi-phi/wiphi-critical-thinking/wiphi-fundamentals/v/normative-and-descriptive-claims • Here is a sample argument, which of these claims is descriptive which is normative: • Wealthy individuals are charged and convicted of crimes less often than poor individuals • White individuals are charged and convicted of fewer crimes than people of color • Studies have found that people commit crimes at roughly the same rate across racial and class lines • In order for a criminal justice system to be fair, it should be applied equally to all people across racial and class lines • In order for a criminal justice system to be morally right it should be fair • The US criminal justice system is not fair or morally right
Look at these examples, should we go to War? • Should the US get involved? What questions need to be asked? How would the public be convinced to support/dissuaded from supporting? (Hint, there are examples of the US getting involved in all of these situaations) • 1. Stateless terrorists initiate a direct attack on American soil • 2. A hostile nation initiates a direct attack on American soil • 3. A ally of the US has been attacked by a hostile nation • 4. A strategic target with desirable natural resources is experiencing a civil war and regime change • 5. An island nation within missile range of the US has went through a regime change, parties hostile to the US have taken over • 6. A conflict between two nations, neither allies nor hostile to the US, are engaged in a brutal war • 7. A country with little strategic value and few desirable resources is engaged in a civil war and regime change • 8. An ally of the US has attacked a nation, neither an ally nor hostile to the US, and the attack was provoked by a desire for that nation’s resources
World War I and the End of Progressivism • What new techniques distinguish WWI? • Chemical warfare • Trench Warfare • Machine guns • Tanks • Airplanes • Massive Death Tolls
Ten million were to die on the battlefield; 20 million were to die of hunger and disease related to the war. And no one since that day has been able to show that the war brought any gain for humanity that would be worth one human life. • The rhetoric of the socialists, that it was an "imperialist war," now seems moderate and hardly arguable. The advanced capitalist countries of Europe were fighting over boundaries, colonies, spheres of influence; they were competing for Alsace-Lorraine, the Balkans, Africa, the Middle East. • In August 1914, a volunteer for the British army had to be 5 feet 8 inches to enlist. By October, the requirement was lowered to 5 feet 5 inches. That month there were thirty thousand casualties, and then one could be 5 feet 3.
Is war inevitable? • Should recruiters be allowed on college and high school campuses? • Who was the “bad guy” in WWI? Why?
What Really Happened • 1914 US: severe recession, intense labor/farmer radicalism • War orders (supplying the British) bailed US out: April 1917, more than $2 billion of goods sold to the Allies • 1897, private foreign investments of US $700 million, 1914 $3½ billion • Wilson's Secretary of State, William Jennings Bryan, believer in neutrality in the war, believed that the US needed overseas markets; praised Wilson as one who had "opened the doors of all the weaker countries to an invasion of American capital and American enterprise"
J. P. Morgan and Company agents for the Allies, 1915 Wilson lifts ban on private bank loans to the Allies, Morgan could lend money • Financier Bernard Baruch headed the War Industries Board, most powerful of wartime government agencies. Bankers, railroad men, and industrialists dominated these agencies • W. E. B. Du Bois, "The African Roots of War“: “in a very real sense Africa is a prime cause of this terrible overturning of civilization which we have lived to see" • Africa was "the Land of the Twentieth Century," because of gold and diamonds of South Africa, cocoa of Angola and Nigeria, rubber and ivory of the Congo, palm oil of the West Coast • No way to measuring public opinion, but no persuasive evidence that the public wanted war • Government worked hard to create consensus: a draft, elaborate propaganda campaign, harsh punishment for those who criticized • A million men were needed, but 6 weeks after the declaration of war only 73,000 volunteers, Congress voted overwhelmingly for a draft
Freedom of speech? • Should there be restrictions on free speech? • Have there been examples where the freedom of speech has been abridged? • http://www.newsmax.com/FastFeatures/patriot-act-law-enforcement-fourth-amendment/2015/06/04/id/648618/
1917, the Espionage Act: penalties up to twenty years in prison for "Whoever, when the United States is at war, shall willfully cause or attempt to cause insubordination, disloyalty, mutiny, or refusal of duty in the military or naval forces of the United States, or shall willfully obstruct the recruiting or enlistment service of the U.S." • Oliver Wendell Holmes: • “The most stringent protection of free speech would not protect a man in falsely shouting fire in a theatre and causing a panic. ... The question in every case is whether the words used are used in such circumstances and are of such a nature as to create a clear and present danger that they will bring about the substantive evils that Congress has a right to prevent.” • Dept. of Justice sponsored American Protective League, June of 1917 units in 600 cities, membership of 100,000, their members were "the leading men in their communities . , . bankers ... railroad men .. . hotel men."
"DRAFT OPPOSITION FAST SPREADING IN STATE," and "CONSCRIPTS GIVE FALSE ADDRESSES." Senator Thomas Hardwick of Georgia "there was undoubtedly general and widespread opposition on the part of many thousands ... to the enactment of the draft law. Numerous and largely attended mass meetings held in every part of the State protested against it. ..." Over 330,000 men were classified as draft evaders • South Dakota farmer and socialist Fred Fairchild: "If I were of conscription age and had no dependents and were drafted, I would refuse to serve. They could shoot me, but they could not make me fight." Tried under the Espionage Act, sentenced to a year and a day at Leavenworth penitentiary.
1st woman in the House of Representatives, Jeannette Rankin, did not respond when called on for the declaration of war. Supporter of the war, went told her "Little woman, you cannot afford not to vote. You represent the womanhood of the country. . . ." On the next roll call she said: "I want to stand by my country, but I cannot vote for war. I vote No.“ • September 1917, Department of Justice, simultaneous raids on 48 IWW meeting halls, 165 IWW leaders arrested for conspiring to hinder the draft, encourage desertion, and intimidate others in connection with labor disputes • Post war feds still feared socialism: the twin tactics of control in the face of revolutionary challenges, reform and repression. • Law passed near end of war provides for deportation of aliens who opposed organized government. Attny Gen. Palmer's Palmer Raids, 249 aliens of Russian birth (including Emma Goldman) deported them to Soviet Russia. The Constitution gave no right to Congress to deport aliens, but the Supreme Court had said, back in 1892, in affirming the right of Congress to exclude Chinese, that as a matter of self-preservation, this was a natural right of the government. • In January 1920, four thousand persons were rounded up all over the country, held in seclusion for long periods of time, brought into secret hearings, and ordered deported
WWI • What is Patriotism? • Is it good? • What is Propaganda? • Is there a relationship between the two?
WWI • What is the irony of people of color serving in WWI?
The “Roaring” 1920’s • What do we know about the 20s? • Political corruption • Prohibition, Bootlegging, rise of the Mob • Women’s right to vote, women at work, the “New Woman”, Flapper • Gay and Lesbian relationships, Gay New York • The Great Migration, the “New Negro” • Rise of the KKK, Nativism, National Origins Act (2% of 1890): • 100 from African Countries, 100 limit for China, Bulgaria, and Palestine; 124 from Lithuania, 2,248 from Russia, 3,845 from Italy; 28,567 from the Irish Free State 34,007 could come from England or Northern Ireland; 51,227 from Germany • Continued immigration despite limits (other immigrants “becoming” white) • Christian Fundamentalism • Credit (purchase of cars), modern department store, new consumer goods • Jazz, Hollywood, Radio, Sports
Stats • 1910-1930 about 2 Million • 1940-1970 about 5 Million • 1970-Present migration has reversed due to decline in the rust belt • This migration spans: • WWI • The rise of Fordism • The resurgence of the Klan • The Great Depression • WWII • The Civil Rights Movement • Black Power • Vietnam • It is impossible to fully understand the dynamics of such a massive movement
Black Culture • During the period there is a flowering of black culture: • Growing music industry • Independent and later mainstream film • Involvement in professional sports • Entrepreneurship: cosmetics industry, food services, local business • Harlem Renaissance: poetry (Langston Hughes), painting (Jacob Lawrence), literature (Richard Wright) • Black resistance grows: Dubois, Garvey, A. Phillip Randolph’s Million Man March, Ella Baker, Islam in Detroit, labor struggles, MLK, Civil Rights, Black Power
Ironies of Migration • Many whites moved for exactly the same reasons and to exactly the same places as blacks (numerically far more whites moved) • Brought racist attitudes that fed into an already racist north • Many migrants returned home, brought northern attitudes/customs with • 1960s brought northern blacks back to the South to organize
Old settler/New settler divide • Old settlers: previously established black communities, some descending from pre-Civil-War, free-black populations, did not like migrants • Why? • Different “manners” (diet, customs, attitudes about sex/relationships) • Speech and clothes • Lacked education • Got into trouble with the law • Upset a careful balance of race relations (made them look bad) • Added to crowding • Used newspapers, churches, schools, clubs to inculcate migrants
